[FM18] The only way to force Gary Neville back into Football Management

[DavidBeckham]

Quote

Dear all,

I'm back! Due to my busy schedule in the past year (I got married!), I wasn't able to get into FM17 that much. I was really into FM15 and had great fun posting career updates on this forum (You can check it out here!). FM18 is finally here and I will follow similar principles for this save. I will be playing as 'Gary Neville', someone whom I have great respect for and I still can't get over the fact that he wouldn't be delving back into football management. FM18 looks like the only option where we could force him back into the game and I am very much looking forward to progressing with the save. You can follow me on twitter @footyasian for mini updates and some football banter  Hopefully you guys will enjoy this thread as much as I do!

Game Status

Current Version: 18.0.1b1030019 (m.e v1800)

Database Size: Large

Selected Nations (Leagues)

Denmark (Superliga Only)

England (Sky Bet Championship And Above)

France (Ligue 1 Conforama Only)

Germany (First Division Only)

Italy (Serie A Only)

Norway (Premier Division Only)

Spain (First Division Only)

Sweden (Premier Division Only)

I have booted up the major European Leagues as I follow them closely in real life and can better relate to them. The Scandinavian Leagues are also loaded up as they are full of cheap hidden gems  

Manager's Profile

Very happy to see both Klopp and Guardiola hating on Gary already  

I'm starting unemployed and will see where the game takes me.. and the job hunting begins!

[nie jem frytek]

Should've started at Valencia and immediately resign.

[DavidBeckham]

43 minutes ago, nie jem frytek said:

Should've started at Valencia and immediately resign.

Didn't want to disrupt the realism of the save mate! 

And it didn't take long! Yes or no? 

[Rikulec]

Great to see you back, and congrats on getting married!

[-Ironhide-]

1 hour ago, DavidBeckham said:

Didn't want to disrupt the realism of the save mate! 

And it didn't take long! Yes or no? 

Yeah, go for it! Can't do much worse than in IRL

[deltablue]

Welcome back DB2

[DavidBeckham]

1 hour ago, deltablue said:

Welcome back DB2

1 hour ago, Rikulec said:

Great to see you back, and congrats on getting married!

Cheers lads! Great to see you guys again! 

1 hour ago, -Ironhide- said:

Yeah, go for it! Can't do much worse than in IRL

Nicked the job off his brother

[DavidBeckham]

Unbelievable situation to kick things off with

[john1]

Good luck with Everton Shame about the injuries!

Congrats on getting married last year 

[BoxToBox]

Welcome back mate, congrats on getting married.

[ManUtd1]

4 hours ago, DavidBeckham said:

Unbelievable situation to kick things off with

Uhh. Why does Ross have a hernia in his ... chest?! What kind of training regimen have they been on?! 

[Vinnyvagus77]

Good luck!

 

BTW - Would it not be wise to start a career once the full game is out rather than the Beta?  Too many things that need resolving before a career can begin.  Just my thoughts but wondered what you and the other thought?

 

For example - Injuries tend to be higher during the beta's from what I've read (and experienced) in the past.

[DavidBeckham]

23 hours ago, john1 said:

Good luck with Everton Shame about the injuries!

Congrats on getting married last year 

 

22 hours ago, BoxToBox said:

Welcome back mate, congrats on getting married.

Cheers lads! Great seeing you guys again

19 hours ago, ManUtd1 said:

Uhh. Why does Ross have a hernia in his ... chest?! What kind of training regimen have they been on?! 

Could be a beta bug! But I'm just too lazy to report it

19 hours ago, Vinnyvagus77 said:

Good luck!

 

BTW - Would it not be wise to start a career once the full game is out rather than the Beta?  Too many things that need resolving before a career can begin.  Just my thoughts but wondered what you and the other thought?

 

For example - Injuries tend to be higher during the beta's from what I've read (and experienced) in the past.

I couldn't resist the temptation to delve straight into the save! I've been starting saves from the beta versions and the bugs didn't seem to be too major

[Vinnyvagus77]

I'm tempted to start a save...but also think, just wait until a week Friday for the full release.

[DavidBeckham]

16 hours ago, Vinnyvagus77 said:

I'm tempted to start a save...but also think, just wait until a week Friday for the full release.

You can start a short-term save to get yourself familiarized with the game

Looking forward to your long-term save mate! 

[DavidBeckham]

Squad Analysis
I knew the squad was imbalanced from Everton's failings in real life, but I didn't know exactly how bad it was. Having gone through the players on the game, I got a rude awakening!

There are only three decent center-backs in the squad, two of them (Jagielka & Williams) are poor in the air and certainly not quick enough for a top class Premier League side. Due to age, Baines is too slow for us and as a result, it will be too risky for us to play high up the pitch. 

Bolasie is out for six months at the start of the game, leaving me with only Mirallas, Lennon and Lookman to play out wide. Up top, the best option is Niasse but he has 12 for Finishing, 11 for Composure and 13 for Off The Ball. We are badly short in the two most important areas of the pitch.

On a more positive note, we are well-stocked in central midfield. Gueye & Schneiderlin will compete for the midfield Anchor spot. I have three options (Sigurdsson, Rooney and Davies) to choose from for the CM-s role. Ross Barkley will definitely come back into the side once he recovers from his month-long injury layoff. He will compete with Klaassen for the spot behind Niasse.  

I'm badly regretting my own decision to disable first window transfer budgets at the start of the game. The only way to strengthen the squad now is to look at loan deals and I'm not even sure that there are players available on the market. Our central defenders are poor in the air and will most likely succumb to pressure if we are bombarded with crosses into the area. With the poor central defence and a lack of cutting edge upfront, we will need to be conservative with our tactics and focus on retaining possession to keep the ball away from the opposition. Hopefully clean sheets will follow and we will be able to nick a goal from set-pieces to bag the important points we need. 

Come on you Toffees!

[Vinnyvagus77]

Actually that's a good point and something I like the idea of - Disabling the first window transfer budgets!  Means the season will start out with the current players the teams have in real life.  Cheers for that! Will use it myself.

[withnail316]

Welcome back and congrats, man.

[BoxToBox]

Would it be worth chucking Klassen up front? If I remember correctly, on FM he has quite decent stats for a forward, if not a quick one.

[DavidBeckham]

18 hours ago, Vinnyvagus77 said:

Actually that's a good point and something I like the idea of - Disabling the first window transfer budgets!  Means the season will start out with the current players the teams have in real life.  Cheers for that! Will use it myself.

It adds realism to the save and makes it more relatable to real life. However, it's a struggle when the squad is so imbalanced like Everton's!

10 hours ago, withnail316 said:

Welcome back and congrats, man.

Cheers mate glad to see you around again! 

3 hours ago, BoxToBox said:

Would it be worth chucking Klassen up front? If I remember correctly, on FM he has quite decent stats for a forward, if not a quick one.

Good call! He has good finishing stats and can play up top competently but he is not quick enough. If he has Niasse's physical stats, he would be a top striker. Will definitely try him upfront though if Niasse struggles to score. Calvert-Lewin picked up an injury in our 1st pre-season friendly too

[DavidBeckham]

1st Competitive Match

It wasn't the easiest of draws when we were paired with Scottish side Aberdeen in the Europa League 3rd Qualifying Round. As the other DMs in the squad weren't match-fit, I played with a conservative and narrow-looking formation. Rooney and Sigurdsson were tasked to play deeper and man-mark the wide AMs. The key here is not to concede as we were the home side (Yes, I'm a huge Mourinho fan ).  

We raced to an early 2-0 lead via a Mirallas brace before Aberdeen went a man down before half-time to make our job easier. Eventually, we turn out 4-0 victors and Michael Keane managed to grab a debut goal :**) However, I took such a long time to get through the game due to the huge changes in the match interface. Who else feels the same?

Medical Centre

Does anyone else face the same problem? We have a huge no. of players on high injury risk due to the many preseason matches we play (once every three days). Do you guys do anything to mitigate the risks?  

[DavidBeckham]

Preseason 2017/2018 - Everton F.C.

Board Expectations

English Premier League: Top half

FA Cup: Fifth Round

Carabao Cup: Not important

Europa League: Quarter Final

Looking at the expectations from the board, I foresee a tough season ahead. As mentioned in an earlier post, the squad is badly imbalanced and we have problems in central defence. To make things worse, our strikers aren't good enough to put the ball in the back of the net regularly. Having disabled the first window transfer budgets, we will have to make do with the players we have and try to stay in the competitions before we strengthen in January.  

Budgets

Transfer: 0 million pounds

Wages: 1.96 million pounds p/w 

Thankfully, there is a small portion of wage budget available and we were able to bring in two loanees without any loan fees.

Players In

Unai Nunez

We were able to bring in a young, solid defender from A. Bilbao and his one-on-one defending is already good enough for this level. As he's only twenty years old, there is room for improvement on his positioning and physicals. If he can improve slightly on these attributes in the next few months, he will have a huge part to play in our long season.

Lys Mousset

We were able to strengthen our strike force slightly with the loan signing of Mousset from Bournemouth. I was a little surprised to see him on the loan market as he could've been a tricky, little player to bring off the bench for Eddie Howe.  He has the ability to hit the target from outside the penalty area consistently and has pace to burn. Bournemouth's loss is our gain and Mousset will provide some much needed backup to Niasse up top. 

Opening Fixtures

We face a tough start in August with the likes of Arsenal and Spurs to come in the league. We absolutely have to pick up maximum points against Newcastle and they aren't too shabby themselves. The Magpies have the likes of Atsu and Ritchie down the wings, as well as the eccentric but talented Shelvey in midfield who are all really decent on the game. Let's hope I'm not already under pressure by the end of the month! 

[DavidBeckham]

Not looking forward to the two ties against Sevilla but would be disappointed if we don't finish runners-up! 

[DavidBeckham]

August 2017/2018 - Everton F.C.

League

We kicked off the league campaign with a must-win home game against Newcastle given the tough nature of the two subsequent league fixtures in August (Arsenal away and Spurs at home). I wanted Niasse to prove to me that he can score goals regularly enough at this level and he obliged by converting Sigurdsson’s Beckham-like cross in the first half. Newcastle began to pile on pressure on our defence by going more direct late in the game and thankfully, we managed to hang on to three very important points.

Arsenal was up next and we travelled to London knowing that we had to be solid and not concede early if we wanted to get something from the game. The lads did the complete opposite and we conceded early in the game after a costly Michael Keane error. I was disappointed as he was the only well-rounded center-back I had. We kept a solid shape throughout the game before going for it in the last ten minutes. Unfortunately, the likes of Sigurdsson and Davies weren’t composed enough when they found room for a shot and we ended up 0-1 losers.

We welcomed Spurs to Goodison Park for our last game of the month and I wasn’t too optimistic as we had to handle the likes of Kane, Alli, Eriksen and Son with a back four of Holgate, Jagielka, Keane and Baines. I tried giving them maximum protection by deploying Gueye and Schneiderlin as Anchor Man and Carrilero respectively. To my surprise, we managed to keep them at bay for most of the game and it gave our attacking players a solid base to work with. Sigurdsson delivered yet another Becks-like cross and Niasse arrived on time to put us in the lead after only three minutes. I went berserk inside but stayed calm on the outside as I knew Spurs had more than enough attacking options to come back in the game. We defended superbly as a team and our wide players (Mirallas & Lookman) were tracking back effectively as defensive wingers.

As Spurs poured forward near the end, Niasse and Sigurdsson combined well again to put the game beyond doubt. We retained possession well in midfield before Niasse picked the Icelander out in acres of space. He wasted no time and smashed the ball past Lloris with his weaker left foot. What a way to wrap up the win!

Burnley mirrored their fantastic form in real life and currently sits top with three wins out of three. We are sixth on six points and Spurs fell to 19th after a less than convincingly start to their league campaign.  

Europa League

As mentioned in an earlier post, we beat Aberdeen 4-0 in the first leg to put us in a commanding position. Niasse scored deep into injury time to help us secure a 1-1 draw in Scotland. We were then drawn with Belgian side Oostende in the Playoffs and Mirallas kept up his good European form by scoring the solitary goal in the first league. Sigurdsson bagged the all important away goal in Belgium to put us through to the Europa League group stages.  

All in all, it had been a very solid month for us as the lads met my expectations results-wise. Bring on September! \o/

[wynter]

On 11/2/2017 at 19:31, DavidBeckham said:

1st Competitive Match

It wasn't the easiest of draws when we were paired with Scottish side Aberdeen in the Europa League 3rd Qualifying Round. As the other DMs in the squad weren't match-fit, I played with a conservative and narrow-looking formation. Rooney and Sigurdsson were tasked to play deeper and man-mark the wide AMs. The key here is not to concede as we were the home side (Yes, I'm a huge Mourinho fan ).  

We raced to an early 2-0 lead via a Mirallas brace before Aberdeen went a man down before half-time to make our job easier. Eventually, we turn out 4-0 victors and Michael Keane managed to grab a debut goal :**) However, I took such a long time to get through the game due to the huge changes in the match interface. Who else feels the same?

Medical Centre

Does anyone else face the same problem? We have a huge no. of players on high injury risk due to the many preseason matches we play (once every three days). Do you guys do anything to mitigate the risks?  

I make sure to have a balance of rest days. If they've played 2 over 5/6 days and your squad is small I tend to give them 2-3 days off the next time there's a 7 day break. I only do that once all my tactics etc; are fully ingrained into the team though. 

[BoxToBox]

Much better than what they're up to in real life, that's for sure!

[DavidBeckham]

On 11/8/2017 at 17:00, wynter said:

I make sure to have a balance of rest days. If they've played 2 over 5/6 days and your squad is small I tend to give them 2-3 days off the next time there's a 7 day break. I only do that once all my tactics etc; are fully ingrained into the team though. 

Thanks for the advice mate! I started giving them rest days too and the injury situation has improved considerably

On 11/8/2017 at 18:03, BoxToBox said:

Much better than what they're up to in real life, that's for sure!

Cheers mate! Performances are starting to go downhill a little in September though!

[DavidBeckham]

Oh Dominic :**(

[DavidBeckham]

September 2017/2018 - Everton F.C.

League

We kicked things off with an away trip to Huddersfield in September and it wasn't the best to watch for the neutrals. The lads kept things solid throughout the game until the 85th minute when Kasey Palmer capitalized on an error by Baines to give the home side the lead. I went direct and chucked Michael Keane upfront in injury time and it paid off. Aaron Lennon delivered a lofted through pass behind Huddersfield's defense and Keane out-muscled his marker to latch onto it before slotting past the keeper. We were good value for the draw and you could say we deserved it.

Brighton visited Goodison Park in our next fixture and to my frustration, we left it late again. Moving into the last fifteen minutes of the game, Hemed capitalized on a defensive lapse from our defence and put Brighton in the lead against the run of play. I went attacking and pushed most of the players' duties up a notch and thankfully, it paid off. Niasse bundled the ball home after a pin-point cross from Lennon to bring us level with eight minutes of regular time to play. Just two minutes later, the right winger ghosted into the area from right wing to volley home from a Mirallas' cross. The crowd went wild and we bagged three precious points.  

The month ended on a low as we got beaten 0-1 away at the bet365 Stadium. Despite dominating most of the game, we couldn't put away our chances and against the run of play, substitute Jese put Stoke in the lead after some poor defending down our left flank. Baines is a legend at Everton but his performances have not been good enough for me thus far. We created enough clear-cut chances to rescue a draw but Mirallas missed the best of the lot with little time left and we traveled back to Merseyside empty-handed.   One win, one draw and one defeat in an unimpressive month.

Europa League

We had a better month in Europe despite us resting a number of first-team players. Klaassen had a decent second game in the CM-A role and arrived bang on time to finish past the keeper to put the result beyond doubt. Youngsters like Kenny, Garbutt and Davies did their first team chances no harm with solid performances and we are now top of the group going into the pair of tough fixtures against Sevilla. 

Carabao Cup

I can only blame myself for the early exit in the Carabao Cup as I opted to rest the entire first team for the tough away tie at Old Trafford. The second string was never gonna be good enough for the rampant Red Devils as we fell to a 0-3 defeat. 

It's not going to get easier in October as we face tough away games at Watford, Liverpool and Sevilla. In addition, we face the defending champions (Chelsea) at home in our first league game of the month. Will Gary Neville do a 'Ronald Koeman' and face the sack early in the season?  

[tajj7]

It is amazing how Everton spent so much but ended up with such an unbalanced squad.

What about Sandro? Always thought his stats looked decent on FM. 

[DavidBeckham]

On 11/13/2017 at 17:44, tajj7 said:

It is amazing how Everton spent so much but ended up with such an unbalanced squad.

What about Sandro? Always thought his stats looked decent on FM. 

We need a center back, a left back, a winger and a striker! Upgrades needed through the squad!

As for Sandro, he looks decent stats wise but I have a weird habit of not playing players who do not speak at least good English. Is anyone else like me?

He is on track though and should play a part in the second half of the season

 

[DavidBeckham]

Possession does count after all  

[BoxToBox]

On 11/13/2017 at 09:44, tajj7 said:

It is amazing how Everton spent so much but ended up with such an unbalanced squad.

What about Sandro? Always thought his stats looked decent on FM. 

He was amazing in 17.

On 11/14/2017 at 16:39, DavidBeckham said:

We need a center back, a left back, a winger and a striker! Upgrades needed through the squad!

As for Sandro, he looks decent stats wise but I have a weird habit of not playing players who do not speak at least good English. Is anyone else like me?

He is on track though and should play a part in the second half of the season

 

I consider it for goalkeepers and defenders, but if a lad's good enough, I'll chuck 'em in.

[DavidBeckham]

6 hours ago, BoxToBox said:

He was amazing in 17.

I consider it for goalkeepers and defenders, but if a lad's good enough, I'll chuck 'em in.

I'm not brave enough to take the risk as I've been let down in the previous versions of the game Goalkeepers/defenders were committing at least an error (or getting sent off) every game when they are not speaking at least good English! Same with midfielders and strikers were missing sitters as well! 

[DavidBeckham]

Gutted

:**(

[BoxToBox]

Sucks losing an important player.

 

I hear Moyes has already contacted him to be a coach...

[Deisler26]

The Jags injury sucks.

Congrats on getting married!

[DavidBeckham]

13 hours ago, BoxToBox said:

Sucks losing an important player.

 

I hear Moyes has already contacted him to be a coach...

No wonder he's considering retirement

9 hours ago, Deisler26 said:

The Jags injury sucks.

Congrats on getting married!

Thanks mate! That injury was badly timed. Michael Keane was out for the last two games and we lost both as well! 

[DavidBeckham]

I've never looked forward this much to a transfer window before 

 

[Deisler26]

Jesus, your players knees...

[DavidBeckham]

21 hours ago, Deisler26 said:

Jesus, your players knees...

Surely not again

[tajj7]

Is Rooney going around kneecapping everyone?! 

I don't think I have seen so many similar injuries. Have your physio's/sports scientist highlighted anything? 

[DavidBeckham]

18 hours ago, tajj7 said:

Is Rooney going around kneecapping everyone?! 

I don't think I have seen so many similar injuries. Have your physio's/sports scientist highlighted anything? 

He isn't, but I'm thinking of offloading him in January. He is a disrupting influence in the dressing room wanting first-team opportunities and both Bolasie and Sandro are on his side

I've been giving rest days to players with high or increased injury risks and the Head of Sports Science has not highlighted anything in particular which is related to knee injuries!

[DavidBeckham]

October & November 2017/2018 - Everton F.C.

League

October was decent until Michael Keane's injury. We kicked off the month with three fantastic points against the defending champions, with our lone Advanced Forward Niasse grabbing the all-important winner. The Senegalese kept up his impressive goal-scoring form, rescuing a draw away at Watford before bagging a brace against the Baggies in a 2-1 win. The blue half of Merseyside went crazy when academy graduate Barkley smashed in the winner in the derby.

Disaster struck in November as we lost our first-choice center-backs (Keane & Jagielka) to injuries. Shane Long capitalized on our slow defense to secure a 2-1 victory for Southampton at Goodison Park. We visited Manchester to face arguably the toughest two fixtures of our league campaign. To nobody's surprise, our central defense were badly exposed once more as we lost both games. Michael Keane finally returned from injury for our home game against Bournemouth and we got back to winning ways with a narrow 1-0 victory. Niasse finds himself near the top of the league's goal-scoring chart after netting his seventh goal in eight games.

Europa League

We put up the best defensive display of the season so far with an encouraging goal-less draw away at Sevilla. Without Michael Keane, we came crashing back down as we were beaten 1-3 at home against the Spanish giants. Wayne Rooney brought us back to winning ways with a brace playing in the Poacher role. A draw in our last game will put us through to the knockout rounds.  

[DavidBeckham]

There's no way back for him now.. 

..and definitely no way back for another too  

It's a sad, sad day.. :**(

[DavidBeckham]

Gutted that I already have two domestic loans in the squad and I can't terminate any of them to free up the slot for Rashford  

[BoxToBox]

Crap! Just qhat Everton need too, pace! 

[tajj7]

I've never seen Utd loan out Rashford before. 

After I watched Everton IRL at the weekend get thrashed by my team Southampton (when we have scored like 7 goals in our last 12 games) this is a tough job, I've not seen Everton do very well in any FM save either, both on mine and on youtubers saves, they always seem to be flirting with relegation.

So with those injuries and the first window turned off you are doing really well.  

[DavidBeckham]

On 11/28/2017 at 18:06, BoxToBox said:

Crap! Just qhat Everton need too, pace! 

Exactly mate, absolutely gutted that I couldn't even attempt to sign him on loan

On 11/28/2017 at 18:06, tajj7 said:

I've never seen Utd loan out Rashford before. 

After I watched Everton IRL at the weekend get thrashed by my team Southampton (when we have scored like 7 goals in our last 12 games) this is a tough job, I've not seen Everton do very well in any FM save either, both on mine and on youtubers saves, they always seem to be flirting with relegation.

So with those injuries and the first window turned off you are doing really well.  

Southampton just signed him on loan successfully on my save! 

It's no surprise that Everton is doing poorly both in real life and in saves as they've such an imbalanced squad! The whole squad is poor in the air (Keane is the player with the highest jumping stat and it's only 14!) Funes Mori has 17 for jumping but he's out for at least 3/4 of the season. They will inevitably face problems with defending set pieces. Left-back is a problem too as Baines is too slow and Garbutt is too raw. 

Thanks for your kind words mate!

[DavidBeckham]

Busy January

We went through a busy January transfer window as I attempted to fill the gaps and holes within the squad. Dummett was brought in as he is considerably quicker than Baines and has better one on one defending than Garbutt. Helder Costa brings another dimension to our attack as he's the only left-footed wide man we have at the club. Pontus Jansson, Lukas Spendlhofer and Nikola Maksimovic will certainly add some much needed aerial power to our squad. Josh Tymon is a decent young left-back and he was brought in on loan as cover. Jordan Ayew was recruited to share the goal-scoring burden with Niasse as Sandro still can't speak good English

Paul Dummett

Helder Costa

Pontus Jansson

Josh Tymon

Lukas Spendlhofer

Nikola Maksimovic

Jordan Ayew